Luigi Mangione turned 28 Wednesday inside a federal lockup as he awaits 2 murder trials ... but he has a lot to celebrate ... at least when it comes to his legal defense fund!

The alleged killer of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson received a $28,038 donation today from a man named Carl ... putting Luigi at a whopping $1.5 million in overall contributions to his fund.

Carl mentioned in his post about the donation that he also directed funds to "victims in comparable situations." He added it's unfortunate that private support is needed in Luigi's case due to the pile of charges against him.

As you know, Luigi has become a folk hero of sorts for people who view executives in the healthcare industry as a bunch of greedy scoundrels. Prosecutors say Luigi fatally shot Thompson with a handgun on a Manhattan street in 2024 because he viewed insurers as parasites that abuse citizens.

In his New York state case, Luigi was charged with and indicted on murder, criminal possession of a weapon and criminal possession of a forged instrument -- a fake ID.

Mangione was also charged by federal prosecutors and indicted on several counts of stalking and murder through use of a firearm. But a judge tossed out the murder/firearm charge, making him ineligible for the death penalty.

Luigi has pleaded not guilty in both cases, with his state trial scheduled to begin September 2026 and the federal trial slated for early next year. He is represented by the powerhouse husband and wife legal team Marc and Karen Agnifilo, along with their co-counsel Jacob Kaplan.

NEED TO KNOW

• Lee Gilley is charged with capital murder in the October 2024 death of his wife, Christa Bauer Gilley, who was pregnant and whom he initially told police had died by suicide

• After an autopsy was performed, Christa's death was ruled a homicide caused by compression of the neck, and Gilley was arrested and charged

• According to a federal complaint, Gilley cut off his court-ordered ankle monitor on Friday, May 1, and fled to Canada before traveling to Italy, where he is now in custody and seeking asylum

A Texas man accused of strangling his pregnant wife in 2024 is facing a new federal charge after authorities say he cut off his ankle monitor and fled to Italy ahead of his capital murder trial.

Lee Gilley, 39, was set to stand trial in the coming weeks in the October 2024 death of Christa Bauer Gilley, 38. On Oct. 7, 2024, Gilley told police his wife died by suicide from an overdose, but an autopsy later ruled her death a homicide caused by compression of the neck. He was arrested on Oct. 11, 2024, and later charged.

A federal criminal complaint filed Tuesday, May 5, alleges Gilley cut off his court-ordered ankle monitor on Friday, May 1, and fled to Canada before traveling to Italy, where he is now in custody and seeking asylum. Italy abolished the death penalty and may block extraditions to countries that still utilize it. The Harris County District Attorney's Office, which is prosecuting the case, has not publicly stated whether it intends to seek the death penalty against Gilley at trial. Gilley would face a minimum of life imprisonment without parole if he is convicted.

The complaint, which was obtained by PEOPLE, alleges that Gilley traveled under a forged identity — Lejeune Jean Luc Olivier — to the Milano Malpensa Airport in Milan, Italy, on an Air Canada flight. When he landed on Sunday, May 3, the complaint alleges, he then presented a passport and other Belgian identification documents to the Milan Border Police. The passport and documents were found to be false and forged, according to the complaint. He was denied entry at the airport and taken into immigration custody, a U.S. Marshal wrote in the complaint, which accuses him of interstate flight to avoid prosecution.

Gilley was awaiting deportation when he allegedly admitted his identity and that he was awaiting trial in the U.S. for the murder of his wife, the complaint states.

Gilley had been required to surrender his passport and wear a GPS ankle monitor as part of the conditions of his $1 million bond.

Courtney Fischer, a spokesperson for the district attorney's office, tells PEOPLE: "Our office continues coordinating with U.S. and Italian authorities to secure this defendant's return to Harris County to stand trial for Capital Murder. We remain committed to pursuing justice while respecting international protocols."

Gilley's attorney, Dick DeGuerin, has said he was unaware that he had left the country and learned of his client's whereabouts from prosecutors on Monday.

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Tim Ballengee, the attorney who represents Christa Gilley’s family, tells PEOPLE that news of Gilley's whereabouts "was definitely a surprise."

Ballengee added, "Obviously, it was devastating to the family, and I think that they were hoping to have the trial and to have him held accountable."

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Christa's family said in a statement to PEOPLE through their attorney that they were "deeply disappointed by the breakdown of the system that was entrusted to hold" Gilley accountable and serve justice for Christa and her unborn child.

"The family has grappled with the loss of Christa while continuing to raise her two young children for more than a year," said their attorney, Tim Ballengee. "During that time, Christa's family and friends have struggled to see the man accused of killing her free on bond while the case proceeded to trial."

If you are experiencing domestic violence, call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233, or go to thehotline.org. All calls are toll-free and confidential. The hotline is available 24/7 in more than 170 languages.

Read the original article on People

Oudone Lothirath was just a child when he arrived in the United States as a Laotian refugee in the early 1980s, in search of a better life.

But some 45 years later, while he was supposed to be undergoing life-extending chemotherapy for his terminal Hodgkin’s lymphoma, Lothirath found himself languishing in a federal immigration detention facility.

His loved ones now say that missing vital chemotherapy sessions in January cut the 57-year-old’s life even shorter, and he is now on his deathbed, receiving hospice care.

“He was responding quite well to the chemo,” Lothirath’s friend and care assistant, Christina Vilay, said. “He probably had another good year.”

Vilay spoke to The Independent in a phone interview Friday from her home in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where she and her husband are caring for Lothirath in his final days. Too sick to speak, Lothirath listened in on the call with Vilay at his bedside.

In early January, Lothirath was caught up in the Trump administration’s immigration surge in Minnesota, where agents swamed his Minneapolis home the day before Renee Good was shot dead by an ICE officer, the Minnesota Star Tribune first reported. He lived one block away from the street where ICU nurse Alex Pretti was killed by federal agents less than two weeks later.

Despite being gravely ill, he was taken to a detention facility more than 1,300 miles away in El Paso, Texas, where he mostly slept on an uncomfortable bunk bed in a large tent with approximately 60 other detainees, until he was sent back to Minnesota, his family said.

“It definitely got worse,” Vilay said of the cancer that has since spread to Lothirath’s bone marrow.

Vilay said she first met Lothirath three years ago at a local Buddhist temple she helps to run in Minneapolis. She has been by his side during his cancer struggle, and is sharing Lothirath’s story on behalf of the family.

Lothirath, who also requires insulin for diabetes and medication for a heart condition, did not receive medical care while in detention and missed two chemotherapy sessions, Vilay claimed. He was so weak after his release that he was immediately hospitalized, and subsequently missed two more chemotherapy sessions, according to the care assistant.

“He was too sick for the fourth session, and then ended up in the hospital again for eight days. So there went the fifth session,” Vilay said.

Had Lothirath undergone the five full rounds of chemotherapy he was due in January, he would’ve had “many more months” left to live, said Vilay, who added she is in regular contact with his oncology team.

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“By then the cancer was growing and made it into the bone marrow. He's been doing life-sustaining chemo for almost two years. It's been a wonder,” Vilay said, and added Lothirath strived to live as normal a life as possible.

“As long as he didn't get side effects, he could go to temple, go to the store and live at home by himself.”

Lothirath was released from ICE detention and flown back to Minnesota after Vilay contacted his doctors and urged them to write a letter to the warden of the facility, detailing the urgency of his condition.

“After being in ICE custody, [seeing] him walking out of that Whipple building,” she said, referring to the notorious federal immigration center in Minneapolis, “This was not the same person.”

The Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In the early 1980s, Lothirath’s parents and their seven children were among the second wave of refugees from South East Asia to arrive in the U.S. after fleeing the violent communist government of Laos, which had taken control of the country in 1975 following the Vietnam War. They spent some time in a refugee camp in Thailand before being accepted to the U.S.

The family settled in Minnesota, which has the third-largest Lao population in America, according to the Lao Assistance Center of Minnesota.

“You escaped with literally your life,” Vilay said. “With whatever little you could carry in your hands…because if they caught you, they shot you on the spot,” she said of the communist regime that had taken charge.

The family was struck by more tragedy shortly after arriving in the U.S., when Lothirath’s father died from cancer.

“You're new to a country, you don't know enough English, and then your father passes,” Vilay said. “[He had] no father figure and mom had several kids to take care of on her own all of a sudden…so it was kind of a rough life.”

During January’s immigration surge, his mugshot was posted on the White House X account in a round up of “Minnesota worst of worst.” In it, the White House, said Lothirath was convicted of aggravated assault with a gun.

When he was 22, Lothirath was convicted in a drive-by shooting for aiding and abetting, according to Vilay.

“He was the only one out of the friends who had a driver's license, so they asked him to drive them somewhere, and it ended up being where they had planned a drive-by,” Vilay claimed. “So they shot a gun out a window. And because he was the driver, he got in trouble.”

According to a local report, his passenger shot from the car Lothirath was driving and struck the rear license plate of another car. He served six months in county jail for the crime, according to Vilay, which ended any path he may have had to become a naturalized U.S. citizen. Ever since then, he was required to regularly check in with immigration officials. His latest work authorization card was issued in 2023 by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, according to documents reviewed by The Independent.

“He's just always worked, he's never married, never had kids,” Vilay said. “He ended up homeless for a while, just down on his luck…But he's always tried to do the right thing.”

Vilay said that caring for him at her home was “just a natural progression” after supporting Lothirath through his cancer diagnosis, and she launched a GoFundMe page to contribute toward his funeral and medical expenses.

He wishes to be cremated and his ashes interred with his late father.

Last week, Vilay and her husband hosted a Buddhist Baci ceremony for Lothirath at home. “The ceremony is like those final blessings…forgiving you for the things that you've done in the past and helping you move on to the future,” she said.

Asked if her friend has any regrets about coming to the U.S. nearly 50 years ago, despite his recent ordeal with immigration enforcement, Vilay paused.

“I know he's appreciative of the life that he's had here, the kind of the freedom… the friends, the family, just everything that he's been able to do,” she said. “It was not a life, living in a camp.”

NEW YORK (AP) — People who buy luxurious second homes in New York City, but live most of the year elsewhere, would have to pay a new tax on the properties under a tentative agreement — an initiative to appease Mayor Zohran Mamdani and liberal voters who launched him into office with chants of “tax the rich.”

But the deal, part of a sprawling budget plan announced Thursday by Gov. Kathy Hochul, would stop short of a major priority for the mayor: a broad tax increase on the state's wealthiest residents.

The proposed tax on multimillion-dollar second homes, known as pied-à-terres, comes as Democrats are trying to address voter concerns about affordability ahead of this year's midterm elections without alienating the business community.

Critics, including prominent business leaders, Republicans, and some moderate Democrats, have warned that slapping new taxes on rich people who maintain apartments and townhouses in New York, but don't consider it their primary home, will just lead the very wealthy to abandon the city.

The details of the proposal are not yet finalized, but Hochul said it would apply to homes worth over $5 million. It would only apply to second homes in New York City, not other state playgrounds for the rich, like Long Island's mansion-dotted Hamptons.

Hochul estimated the tax would bring in at least $500 million for the city annually.

After the governor's announcement, the state's legislative leaders warned that much was still left to be negotiated. “There is no budget deal,” said Carl Heastie, Democratic speaker of the state Assembly, adding that much of the financial backbone of the budget had yet to be decided.

Meanwhile, the New York City chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America, of which Mamdani is a member, blasted out text messages to supporters saying the budget proposal doesn't go far enough to close New York City's multibillion-dollar budget deficit or fund needed social programs.

“Hochul is trying to shove a deal down our throats with no new taxes on the rich besides the pied-a-terre tax, which only fills 10% of NYC’s deficit," the organization's co-chair, Gustavo Gordillo, said in a statement.

Hochul, a Democrat running for reelection, opposes broader tax hikes on the rich, saying it risks encouraging wealthy residents and businesses to flee to lower-tax states.

“We were able to accomplish this extraordinary budget, with all these accomplishments, without raising statewide taxes at all,” Hochul told reporters Thursday.

Mamdani has cast the pied-a-terre tax as a victory, while still pushing — sometimes in personal terms — for more, targeted tax hikes on the very wealthy.

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Last month, the mayor, seeking to boost excitement about the new tax plan, posted a video of himself standing outside a luxury building where billionaire hedge fund CEO Ken Griffin purchased a penthouse for about $239 million.

“When I ran for mayor, I said I was going to tax the rich,” Mamdani said in the clip, which has been viewed on X more than 52 million times, before mentioning Griffin by name. “Well today, we're taxing the rich.”

Griffin later said he was shocked by the video, calling it “frightening," and potentially threatening to his safety. He added that the CEO of UnitedHealthcare, Brian Thompson, had been shot to death in the same neighborhood, allegedly by someone upset about perceived corporate greed. Griffin said his company has decided to expand its operations in Miami.

“What the mayor of New York has made clear to my partners, and principally my New York partners, is we need to double down on our bet in Miami,” he said at an economic conference in California this week. “Because we want to be in a state that embraces business.”

Democratic lawmakers launch probe on some Trump pardon recipients, process 03:31

Senate and House Democrats have launched an investigation into whether pardons and commutations issued by President Trump were driven by "pay-to-play dynamics," according to letters obtained by CBS News.

Among the pardons being probed by lawmakers are those granted to cryptocurrency billionaire Changpeng Zhao, who pleaded guilty to money laundering; nursing home operator Joseph Schwartz, who was convicted of tax crimes; and entrepreneur Trevor Milton, sentenced to four years in prison in 2023 after being convicted of lying to investors.

On Thursday, California congressmen Dave Min and Raul Ruiz, as well as Vermont senator Peter Welch sent letters to more than a dozen recipients of executive clemency — seeking to unearth how they may have received favorable treatment from Mr. Trump or his advisers "through intermediaries, financial contributions, or other forms of influence."

The Democrats are also examining the impact of pardons and commutations on thousands of financial victims. The letters note that Mr. Trump's acts of clemency are "depriving victims of compensation and justice," citing the president's elimination of hundreds of millions of dollars in restitution — money owed to crime victims — and fines.

Clemency has come under scrutiny during Mr. Trump's second term with his pardons or commutations of the sentences of a number of allies who faced prosecution — as well as those who hired people close to him. In the letters, the Democrats argued the president has appeared to reward his allies in a manner that departs from the Supreme Court's description of executive clemency "as 'an act of grace' exercised for the 'public welfare.'"

The lawmakers asked for any contracts showing how much money has been paid by the clemency recipients to lawyers, lobbyists, social media influencers and others who advocated on their behalf to Mr. Trump.

They also requested communications between the recipients or people acting on their behalf with federal officials, records showing any donations to Mr. Trump or groups affiliated with him and other documents related to clemency efforts.

"If they don't respond, they run the risk of highlighting themselves — of being the subjects of future congressional investigations and creating more of a target on their backs for potential further criminal prosecutions," Min told CBS News, adding that the idea that people can "get around the justice system" after being convicted "gets to the heart of what is wrong with America right now under this administration."

Because Democrats are in the minority in both the House and the Senate, they lack subpoena power and can only request cooperation from the pardon recipients. But this unusual pipeline for clemency will likely be a top oversight area for Democrats should they take back majorities in either chamber of Congress in the midterm elections this year. That would give them the authority to compel documents on clemency and other areas of oversight.

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Perhaps the most high-profile clemency act that the lawmakers are investigating is Mr. Trump's pardon last year of Zhao, the founder of crypto exchange Binance. Federal disclosures show that the clemency push was led by Ches McDowell, a lawyer and lobbyist who is a friend of Donald Trump Jr., as well as Teresa Goody Guillén, a lawyer who has represented Zach Witkoff, the son of Mr. Trump's Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff.

In a letter to Zhao, Democrats cited reporting on how Binance partnered with World Liberty Financial, a crypto company founded by the Trump and Witkoff families. "Public reporting also indicates that you and Binance played an important role in brokering a massive investment in the Trump family's crypto business, surging the Trump Stablecoin to a $2.1 billion valuation," the letter read.

The White House denied any impropriety in the Zhao pardon and others. Press secretary Karoline Leavitt said that anyone "spending money to lobby for pardons is foolishly wasting their money" and that the administration has a "robust pardon review process." Goody Guillén has also said there was no "quid pro quo."

"President Trump's abuse of the presidential pardon has let criminals walk free and deprived victims of hundreds of millions of dollars in restitution, with little to no explanation," said Welch, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which oversees clemency at the Department of Justice. The DOJ traditionally handles pardons and commutations but its former pardon attorney, Liz Oyer, previously told CBS News that the Trump administration "appears to be working around" the agency rather than with it "to vet and review applications for pardons."

"This was a departure from over 100 years of practice," Oyer said, claiming that clemency has been run out of the White House "without input from the Office of the Pardon Attorney."

The letters to the clemency recipients asked for responses by May 22.

Schwartz, who pleaded guilty to charges stemming from a $38 million payroll tax fraud scheme involving nursing homes he owned, had served just three months of his three-year prison sentence outside New York City when Mr. Trump pardoned him. It followed Schwartz's payments to right-wing operatives and lawyers who are close to the president and Alice Marie Johnson, Mr. Trump's "pardon czar," The New York Times reported.

The lawmakers are also probing clemency to former healthcare executive Lawrence Duran — who was convicted of Medicare fraud and received a commutation from Mr. Trump wiping away $87 million in owed restitution. And they sent questions to Milton, the founder of the since-bankrupt automotive company Nikola.

In March 2025, Mr. Trump pardoned Milton — letting him off the hook for roughly $680 million in restitution to shareholders. It came after Milton and his wife donated at least $3 million to Mr. Trump's 2024 campaign and other political groups in his orbit.

A White House official said earlier this year that Milton's donations "played absolutely no role" in his pardon.

Others facing congressional scrutiny include former private equity executive David Gentile, who was convicted of running a $1.6 billion Ponzi scheme and saw his $15.5 million in restitution wiped away when Mr. Trump commuted his sentence. Senate Democrats raised concerns about the commutation last December — arguing that it "represents a betrayal of more than 17,000 innocent Americans from all walks of the political spectrum that lost over $1 billion in life savings because of his crimes."

Also receiving letters were Paul Walczak, a pardoned tax cheat whose mother raised millions of dollars for Mr. Trump, and real estate developer Timothy Leiweke — who was pardoned after hiring lawyer and Trump ally Trey Gowdy following a conviction for alleged contract bid rigging. After that pardon, senior Justice Department officials "felt completely kneecapped by the president," a former Trump administration official told The Free Press.

"The thing that rankles me even further is the deprivation of restitution, money that they were supposed to pay back to the victims of their frauds," Min, a member of the House Oversight Committee, told CBS News.

"Now the victims get hit twice, because not only are the people that defrauded them not serving their time — not paying their debt to society — they're literally not paying their debts to the people they defrauded," the congressman added.